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Fan Translation: Great Fray Smash Brothers) is a series of crossover/fighting games published by Nintendo, with characters from various franchises that try to knock each other off the screen.

It has become one of the quickest-selling and most popular series in Nintendo's history, and Super Smash Bros. Melee is the best-selling Nintendo GameCube game. Masahiro Sakurai has directed all five games in the series, the latest being Super Smash Bros. Ultimate.

Super Smash Bros. Melee (2001)

The second installment, released for the Nintendo Gamecube, featured a much larger cast of characters including all of the originals, in which some were still locked others were available from the start. Some new characters were Peach, Bowser, Zelda and Ice Climbers.

Super Smash Bros. Brawl(2008)

The third installment for the Wii, featured a slightly larger cast then Melee, including a lot of "character replacements" since some of the characters from Melee are gone from this one. Perhaps the most effective replacement on the Smash community was Lucario replacing Melee'sMewtwo. Some new characters were Pokémon Trainer, Lucas, Pit, Olimar, Diddy Kong and Meta Knight. The first one in the series to contain third party characters (Sonic the Hedgehog and Solid Snake) and is the first game in the series to include the Final Smash. This game introduced a fully-fledged Story Mode.

Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS and Wii U (2014)

The fourth and fifth installments was released for the Nintendo 3DS and Wii U. The two titles have the ability to trade custom fighters. The two games also share a roster but, they both otherwise have numerous different features, with the Wii U version having the most content. It was also confirmed by Nintendo that Namco Bandai developed the game to increase production. New 3rd party characters were; Mega Man, Pac-Man, Ryu, Cloud, and Bayonetta, while Solid Snake and all mentions of Metal Gear were completely absent from the game.

Super Smash Bros. Ultimate (2018)

On March 8th 2018, at the end of their scheduled Nintendo Direct broadcast, Nintendo confirmed that a Super Smash Bros. game was scheduled for release on the Nintendo Switch later in 2018. The game was unveiled via a pre-rendered teaser trailer, which confirmed the return of series veterans Mario and Link, while also revealing that the Inkling from the Splatoon series would debut as a playable fighter in the roster. It was revealed at E3 2018 that the game would be titled Super Smash Bros. Ultimate and feature every fighter that has appeared in the series before including Pichu and Solid Snake. The game included only a small number of newcomers with several of them being Echo Fighters, characters that had the same moveset as another fighter with slight differences. The game also brought back most of the stages in the series with over 100 included in the base game. The game also replaced Trophies with Spirits which were Event Match-style battles with characters in the roster that represented various characters from across Nintendo history.

Characters

Playable characters

There are 76 playable characters in the series as a whole. Super Smash Bros. has 12, Melee has 25, Brawl has 35, 3DS/Wii U has 58, and Ultimate has 76 (These numbers do not account for transformations or unannounced characters). Some characters are playable from the start, but some are unlockable through achievements or downloadable content.

Bold indicates that a character doesn't need to be unlocked through any special criteria, but isn't seen on the character select screen at the start of the game.

Non-playable characters

Competitive Community

The Super Smash Bros. series has a dedicated community known for playing an older entry over newer ones. Super Smash Bros. Melee is by far the most played game. It has also quite a large following in general, being one of the most watched streams at EVO. Melee continues to be played at major tournaments worldwide, despite a brief decline after the release of Brawl.

Brawl was received incredibly poorly by the community, so much so, that there were a few quite a few mods to adjust gameplay that took off. Notable ones include Project M and Brawl Minus.

Super Smash Bros. for Wii U was and still is extremely popular in competitive play, being played at tournaments globally. Although not as popular as Super Smash Bros. Melee, Super Smash Bros. for Wii U cleared up the series' reputation after Brawl. The 3DS edition of the game was also popular at tournaments, but was quickly left behind after the Wii U version's release.

Ultimate has received an unprecedented competitive following, attracting players new and old, even some players who were extremely loyal to one game. This following has proved to be very large and does not seem to be going away anytime soon.

Music

Each game has a number of arranged soundtracks of those from original games. For example, the "Ground Theme" from Super Mario Bros. has been arranged by several composers throughout the series, including original composer Koji Kondo. In addition, many music tracks have been taken directly from the original games, such as "Battle of the Storm Hill" from Donkey Kong Jungle Beat.

Many of the games' composers are consisted of freelance and in-house musicians to provide arrangements and main themes. Until Super Smash Bros. Brawl, the sound staff of HAL Laboratory, notably Hirokazu Ando and Shogo Sakai, have provided music for the games. Starting in Brawl, while Sakai and the HAL music team returned to provide new tracks for the game, freelance and third-party composers have assisted in the music development as well.

The soundtracks in Smash Bros. are mostly digitally created, while many also recorded (most notably the Super Smash Bros. Melee orchestrated opening theme).

Reception

Super Smash Bros. has received praise for its multiplayer mode. The single-player mode was criticized for its perceived difficulty and lack of features.

Super Smash Bros. Melee received a positive reception from reviewers. IGN's Fran Mirabella III stated that it was "in an entirely different league than the N64 version"; GameSpot's Miguel Lopez praised the game for offering an advanced "classic-mode" compared to its predecessor, while detailing the Adventure Mode as "really a hit-or-miss experience."

Super Smash Bros. Brawl received a perfect score from the Japanese magazine Famitsu. Thunderbolt Games gave the game 10 out of 10, calling it "a vastly improved entry into the venerable series". IGN critic Matt Casamassina, in his February 11 Wii-k in Review podcast, noted that although Brawl is a "solid fighter," it does have "some issues that need to be acknowledged," including "long loading times" and repetition in the Subspace Emissary.

Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS and Super Smash Bros. for Wii U held ratings of 85/100 and 92/100 on Metacritic and 86.10% and 92.39% on GameRankings.

Daniel Dischoff of Game Revolution stated "It's true that Super Smash Bros. evolves every time with regard to new features, items, and characters to choose from. While your favorite character may not return or a few annoying pickups may force you to turn off items altogether, this represents the biggest leap forward Smashers have seen yet."

Super Smash Bros sold 1.4 million copies in Japan, and 2.3 million in the U.S. Melee sold over 7 million units worldwide, becoming the best-selling GameCube title. Brawl sold 1.524 million units in Japan as of March 30, 2008, and sold 1.4 million units in its first week in the United States, becoming Nintendo of America's fastest selling title. The 3DS version has sold more than 3.22 million copies worldwide as of October 2014, while the Wii U version became the fastest-selling Wii U game, with 3.39 million units worldwide in two months. Super Smash Bros. Ultimate is the fastest selling console title in Nintendo's history with it being the best launch for an exclusive in the United States. The title sold over 12 million in under a month, almost surpassing Brawl's lifetime to date sales.

Trivia

PlayStation All Stars: Battle Royale is a game made on the concept of this game but instead of Nintendo characters, it is replaced with with Playstation characters.

It was originally suggested by the series creator and director, Masahiro Sakurai, that Super Smash Bros. Brawl was supposed to be the last game he would direct. He has mentioned similar things for Super Smash Bros. for 3DS / Wii U and Super Smash Bros. Ultimate.